Did The NYTimes Just Offload Its Front Page To The Atlantic?

from the seems-like-it dept

We've already pointed out how the NY Times' "paywall," which says it's okay if you click from any other site rather than the NY Times' own site, appears to harm the NY Times and help competitors, and it seems some competitors are stepping up into the breach. The Atlantic, which has embraced the internet, perhaps like no other old school publication, has now started highlighting which NY Times stories you might want to read each day. And, since you're coming from The Atlantic, you can read those articles without having to pay the paywall master. In other words, the Atlantic now provides a better front page to the NY Times than the NY Times does itself.

The NYT could do a lot better if it fired all those expensive reporters and editors and just linked to whatever news sounded best on the rest of the Internet. They can also get rid of Paul Krugman - he'll be forced to go blog on HuffPost for free and then the NYT can just link him there (adding their own ads to the transaction, natch).

Re:

I mean, if you think about it, let's say the NYT did fire all of its reporters and opinion writers and such. All those people are either going to find jobs at other news organizations, or become baristas. But the ones that find other jobs will continue writing news, and they'll post it on the Internet for free because who wants to be behind a paywall amirite? Some of the baristas will blog in their spare time, and so their content is also fair game.

The NYT can then just Google all their former reporters and link to whatever they write. It will be effectively identical content but they won't be paying a dime for it.

They could also just rehost the content on their own site and claim fair use so they can capture all the ad revenue. After all, how can you affect the market for a work when the work is given away for free?

Re:

They could. But why should people go to the NYT site when they can go the the site of the blogger or reporter (or whatever news org they work for)? Unless, the NYT actually builds a better site (which is unlikely, given their track record) people won't be visiting it and the Ad revenue will drop to zero. But, as long as the don't forget to link back to the original story, it's their problem how they get their content.

ny times

I am interesting in seeing if this ill devised scheme of charging a monthly fee for the Times will be just unsuccessful or utterly unsuccessful. They should be encouraging circulation in order to increase ad revenues, not limiting consumption so that their ad revenue decreases.

My visits to the times decreased dramatically when I started to get prompts for registration simply to read articles. I then started to get news elsewhere, then I figured about not saving Times' cookies, but by then I had already replaced the Times with other sites of preference. My loss? Theirs? Who knows, but certainly a relationship altered for good.

Such a Great Idea

I live in NYC. The Times is as New York as the Yankees, Times Square, Wall St., and Central Park. But I can't support a paper that puts such restrictions on its content and, as I've said in other comments, seems to be failing at every step.

The way I consume my news is through RSS - I've created my own aggregation system via Google's Reader & the various iPhone/iPad apps that sync with it. I expect summaries before clicking on a full article or seeing the whole thing without restriction.

The Atlantic Wire is a perfect substitute. And by acting as a human filter, I can focus on news that actually might have more of an impact to me if someone outside of NYC thought it important to mention on their site.

I'm impressed and I'll be looking into their site more. I actually never heard of it until now but I can promise I'll be visiting often to get the summary of my (former) newspaper.